TimesLIVE Podcasts True Crime South Africa

True Crime South Africa

True Crime South Africa is the first victim-focused true-crime podcast in the country.

Host, Nicole Engelbrecht, researches each case herself using media coverage, trial footage, social media sources and often by talking to some of the individuals involved. Using her skills as a creative writer and her passion for true crime, she crafts each script to ensure that listeners are given a deep dive into the case mechanics as well as an understanding of the victims as human beings.

The podcast covers both solved and unsolved South African true crime cases. The unsolved cases are often cold cases which can benefit from awareness being brought to them. This concept has been used in the US for many years and to great success. The listenership formed around true crime podcasts becomes a community that advocates for victims and resolution for families. South African victims now have their own voice too.

True Crime South Africa publishes weekly, alternating between full-length case episodes and shorter minisodes which discuss true crime cases that are currently in the media. The podcast launched on the 22nd of June 2019 and is making waves in the South African podcast community. On the True Crime South Africa social media pages, South African true crime fans finally have a place to call home where they can express their views on cases and discuss the details with like-minded people.

True Crime South Africa is published in conjunction with Arena Holdings, publishers of TimesLIVE, BusinessLIVE, and SowetanLIVE. 

Keywords: crime, true crime, murder, abduction, South Africa, police, law and order
Weekly English Explicit South Africa True Crime · News Narrated by Scott Peter Smith
337 Episodes
300 – 320

Episode 15 - The Wemmer Pan Serial Killer

True Crime South Africa — In 1997, the man who had been hunting young couples at Wemmer Pan for a year was arrested. There was another maniac stalking the streets of Johannesburg though, attacking and killing tailors with a hammer. Police would soon discover that the Wemmer Pan serial killer…
11 Dec 2019 53 min

Episode 14 - The Springs House of Horrors

True Crime South Africa — On the 20th of May 2014, 17 police officers and three social workers pulled up outside a double-storey house in a busy road in Springs on the East Rand of Gauteng. They’d received a complaint regarding a child at risk within the house. What they…
5 Dec 2019 1 hr 04 min

Spotlight Minisode 8 - The GBV Edition

True Crime South Africa — The annual commemoration of 16 days of activism against gender-based violence began on the 25th of November and runs until the 10th of December. This week True Crime South Africa dedicates its Spotlight minisode to crimes of this nature (24-hour Trauma Helpline: 082-821-3447) (Listener Voice…
28 Nov 2019 23 min

Episode 13 - The Samurai Killer

True Crime South Africa — On Monday, the 18th of August 2008, 18-year-old Morné Harmse arrived at his school in Krugersdorp. Armed with three swords and replica masks resembling those worn by heavy metal band, Slipknot, he went on a rampage taking one innocent life and seriously wounding three other…
21 Nov 2019 1 hr 12 min

TCSA Spotlight Minisode 7

True Crime South Africa — This week in True Crime South Africa’s Spotlight minisode we reveal the details behind a 12-year-old cold case that was recently solved through the hard work of a dedicated detective and a slam-dunk DNA match. Body part discoveries were another hot topic in true crime…
14 Nov 2019 18 min

Episode 12: Unsolved: The River Strangler

True Crime South Africa — In 1995 a serial killer prowled the streets of Pinetown, KwaZulu-Natal. He would take the lives of two teenage girls and leave two other young women traumatised before seemingly disappearing into thin air. (Community Intervention Centre (24-hour Trauma Helpline 082-821-3447)
8 Nov 2019 38 min

TCSA Spotlight 6

True Crime South Africa — In this week's Spotlight minisode: Is Sean Kelly - the alleged hammer murderer from Sedgefield - involved in the disappearance of Marie Ostbo? We also discuss updates on South African murderer in Alaska, Brian Smith and progress on the case of missing 8-year-old, Amahle Thabethe…
1 Nov 2019 23 min

Episode 11 - The Shoelace Killer

True Crime South Africa — In 2003, Wesley Julyan was 18-years-old when he was convicted of the murder of Kenneth van Aardt. He and his accomplice had strangled the man with a shoelace, walking away from their horrendous crime with just R 70. Julyan was sentenced to 13 years in…
25 Oct 2019 47 min

TCSA Spotlight 5

True Crime South Africa — In this week's spotlight minisode we discuss a South African killer in Alaska who filmed his crime as well as the murder of a young mother who was viciously stabbed to death while on holiday. (24-hour trauma helpline: 082-821-3447)
18 Oct 2019 25 min

The Unsolved Murder of Tracey Thompson

True Crime South Africa — In March 2005, Carol Thompson received the news that no mother should ever have to hear. The body of her 24-year-old daughter Tracey, who had been missing for a week, had been found on a piece of agricultural land just outside Benoni. While that call…
11 Oct 2019 1 hr 41 min

Interview: My Pen Pal, The Serial Killer

True Crime South Africa — In 1996, Moses Sithole was sentenced to 2410 years in prison for a prolific series of murders. The mind of a man who could commit such atrocities has been a fascination to professionals and the public alike. Many journalists attempted to interview him and Moses…
3 Oct 2019 37 min

Episode 9 - The ABC Killer

True Crime South Africa — Moses Sithole has the highest body count of any convicted serial killer in South Africa. For two years in the 1990s, he terrorised the women of Atteridgeville, Boksburg and Cleveland earning him the moniker
27 Sep 2019 1 hr 42 min

Episode 9 - The ABC Killer

Moses Sithole has the highest body count of any convicted serial killer in South Africa. For two years in the 1990s, he terrorised the women of Atteridgeville, Boksburg and Cleveland earning him the moniker of the ABC Killer. Community Intervention Centre (24-hour Trauma helpline: 082 821 3447); see www.truecrimesouthafrica.com for a…
27 Sep 2019 1 hr 42 min

TCSA: Spotlight 4

True Crime South Africa — In September 2018, South Africa woke up to the horrifying news that a 7-year-old girl had been raped in the toilets of a restaurant in Pretoria. The outrage was fuelled by video footage taken by a bystander of the offender being confronted. A year later,…
19 Sep 2019 22 min

TCSA: Spotlight 4

In September 2018, South Africa woke up to the horrifying news that a 7-year-old girl had been raped in the toilets of a restaurant in Pretoria. The outrage was fuelled by video footage taken by a bystander of the offender being confronted. A year later, September 2019 saw the man…
19 Sep 2019 22 min

Episode 8: The Unsolved Murder of Jacoba Schroeder

True Crime South Africa — In 1949, 18-year-old Jacoba Schroeder had been drawn to the bright lights of Johannesburg in the hopes that she could pull herself out of poverty and cast aside the shackles of her social class. Sadly, Jacoba was looking for a knight in shining armour in…
12 Sep 2019 1 hr 10 min

Episode 8: The Unsolved Murder of Jacoba Schroeder

In 1949, 18-year-old Jacoba Schroeder had been drawn to the bright lights of Johannesburg in the hopes that she could pull herself out of poverty and cast aside the shackles of her social class. Sadly, Jacoba was looking for a knight in shining armour in the wrong place and she…
12 Sep 2019 1 hr 10 min

TCSA:Spotlight 3

True Crime South Africa — In this week’s True Crime South Africa Spotlight minisode we discuss the scourge of gender-based violence and do a deep dive into some interesting information that emerged during the pre-sentencing hearing of the last three Electus per Deus members. Zak Valentine, Cecilia Steyn and Marcel…
5 Sep 2019 38 min

TCSA:Spotlight 3

In this week’s True Crime South Africa Spotlight minisode we discuss the scourge of gender-based violence and do a deep dive into some interesting information that emerged during the pre-sentencing hearing of the last three Electus per Deus members. Zak Valentine, Cecilia Steyn and Marcel Steyn were found guilty of…
5 Sep 2019 38 min

Podcast: Episode 7: The Body in the Boot

True Crime South Africa — On the 22nd of September 2013 the badly decomposed body of a man was found in the boot of a car at Monte Casino in Fourways, South Africa. The investigation that followed would take police into the seedy underworld of sex work, drugs, fraud and…
29 Aug 2019 1 hour
300 – 320